Overview of the Active Directory Schema Snap-in

Applies To: Windows Server 2008, Windows Server 2008 R2, Windows Server 2012

You can use the Active Directory Schema Microsoft Management Console (MMC) snap-in to view and manage Active Directory Domain Services (AD DS) schema objects. The Active Directory Schema snap-in has more strict installation and use requirements than other administrative tools. To make changes in the Active Directory Schema snap-in, you must be a member of the Schema Admins security group in the forest root domain of your Active Directory forest. By default, the Administrator account for the forest root domain is the only member of the Schema Admins group.

With the Active Directory Schema snap-in, you can view class and object definitions, provide administrative access to the schema, and modify schema classes and attributes. However, modifying the schema is an advanced and complex operation that is best handled by experienced programmers and administrators. For this reason, information about modifying the schema is located primarily in programming documentation. For information about modifying the schema, see Active Directory Schema (https://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=80809).

Additional references

Installing, Securing, and Viewing the Schema